Happy Family
by That Aerin
Summary: The Marauders are trying to stay a happy family after Hogwarts, but things are changing rapidly with Proposing!James, Jobless!Remus, Traitor!Peter, and of course, Sirius. Need I say more?
1. Morning

**Author's Notes:** A prequel, sort of to Baby Nimbus 600? Nah. More MWPP fluff. : ) This takes place before James and Lily get married, so at the moment James, Sirius, and Remus are sharing a flat. (Peter is still living at home.) Anyways, this was inspired by a piece of artwork by Mushi, which was so spiffy I decided you need to see it too. (Get rid of all those spaces first.)

http:// www. kekkai. org/ bishink/ remus/ happy.jpg

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**Happy Family**

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The one bedroom flat really was too small, but they didn't mind. They had shared a dormitory for seven years, after all. The three beds that were arranged rather haphazardly around the room held various bedclothes and linens tumbled about. 

Remus grinned at the ceiling, happy at his luck that he was rooming with his two best friends. Well, he mused, Peter was still living at home because his mother wouldn't let him live in the city, but it was all right. He tumbled over to get out of the bed, and fell abruptly to the floor, entangled in the white bedsheets. Remus quickly untangled himself, and looked up to see if he had disturbed James or Sirius.

A moderate breathing could be heard from one lump, and telling from the messy black hair and the glasses that were tossed carelessly onto the table, the lump was James. Still asleep. 

A louder, more abrupt snoring came from the other lump, which Remus could see a foot poking out. That would be Sirius. Remus chuckled to himself. The two Aurors came home late every night, exhausted. 

Remus sighed. James and Sirius were busy fighting Dark wizards and Merlin knew what else, and he was still unemployed—lucky, he supposed, to share a flat with James and Sirius at all, considering the difficulty he had finding a place to stay after his parents had died. Remus pulled on a pair of reading glasses. Best not to think about that, Remus thought. Better try to find a new job.

Remus blinked. Suddenly the world had gone fuzzy. He pulled off the glasses, and found that they were James' round black ones. He smiled in spite of himself, letting the memories wash over him. There was that scratch from second year, when James walked into the bedpost. He never had gotten new glasses—just enlarged them. Always said that if he was blind without them, he better stick to one pair he was used to. Remus pulled on his own golden frames, placing James' glasses back on the table.

Remus pulled on a clean white shirt from the floor. At least, it looked like it was clean. Was this shirt even his? Remus sniffed it slightly. It smelled of motor grease. Well. It was Sirius' then. Or Sirius had worn it. Well, they had lived for seven years in the same room together, and you still couldn't tell their clothes apart. 

Remus had been poring over the classified ads in the Daily Prophet for a while when a loud voice echoed into his ear.

"Department of Regulations of Magical Creatures. Desk Clerk. Forty Galleons a week. Think you could handle that, Moony?"

Remus glanced at Sirius, who was peering intently over his shoulder. He was wearing a sleeveless white top and his favorite Bludger patterned knickers.

"When was the last time you washed those, Padfoot?" Remus asked in a disgusted tone.

"Probably last month," Sirius grinned at him cheekily. He leaned in closer to the newspaper, humming to himself.

James tumbled into the room. He crashed blindly into the sofa. "Argh," James muttered. "Who put that there? And where are my glasses?"

"I think you did, Prongs," said Remus nonchalantly.

Sirius smirked at James. "Yeah, you suggested it should be placed right there."

James walked warily over to the table, trying not to bump into anything else. He was unsuccessful. He squinted at Sirius. "Glasses?"

"On your bedside table," said Remus, not looking away from the Daily Prophet.

Sirius reached over and rumpled James' hair. "Better get them, Prongs."

There was a few moments of silence.

"Good morning," the three of them said to each other all at once.

James smiled and tumbled back to the bedroom. Sirius grinned at Remus. "We are a happy family, aren't we, Moony?"

James crashed into the wall, and they could hear him cursing. Remus looked over amusingly while Sirius guffawed. "Yeah. We are," he said simply.


	2. Breakfast

**Author's Notes: **Look! There's more! Wowness. Review, por favor! :) 

"Coming to work, Padfoot?" James' voice called from the bedroom, where, from the sound of it, was no longer blind.

Sirius scratched his chin in mock thought. "After the Pineapple Incident, I'm not sure…"

Remus snorted. "Pineapple Incident? Do I even want to know about that?"

James walked in, fully dressed, and grinning. "You should have been there, Remus. The battle simulator for practice makes 'enemies' for you to hex—"

"And it all comes from this box thing that looked like a piece of Muggle equipment," added Sirius. "So then yesterday, Moody says we have to beat as many as possible—"

"I went first, and got thirty-seven—" said James, "Then this prat here goes and—"

"I beat the whole machine," continued Sirius smugly.

Remus raised an eyebrow. 

"All three hundred and forty-two enemies, vanquished!"

Remus chuckled. "What did you do, throw pineapples at them?"

James shook his head. "He transfigured the box thing into a pineapple."

Sirius shrugged. "I was aiming for a watermelon, but oh well."

"Moody was furious—was raving mad—"

"And the rest of the Auror Division was laughing their pants off," finished Sirius. He bowed.

James gave Sirius one last look. "So—"

Sirius plopped down at the table, joining Remus. "I'm going to take the day off. Tell him I was devastated and couldn't come to work."

James rolled his eyes, took several pieces of Remus' toast, and Apparated.

Remus looked at his empty plate, then at Sirius. Remus eyed Sirius over the Prophet. "What are you doing today, then? Besides making me breakfast, that is."

Sirius grinned at him. "Want to come, Remus? It'll be you and me, just like good old days—"

"Are you going on your bike?" Remus asked warily.

Sirius leaned back on the chair, putting his feet on the table. "Sure," he said.

"I am just letting you know, there is no way I am getting on that bike. It's lethal."

"Lethal, Moony? You have no sense of adventure."

"This coming from a man whose sense of fun is out on the Quidditch field, facing a dozen Bludgers at once."

"That _is_ fun," retorted Sirius, and leaned back some more.

Remus carefully folded the Daily Prophet and set it down, waiting.

Sirius tilted the chair further.

Remus waited. 

Suddenly Sirius lost his balance, and the chair flipped over, dumping Sirius unceremoniously onto the floor.

Remus grinned.

"I'm okay," Sirius announced, getting back up. "Stop laughing."

The doorbell rang, and Sirius, still muttering to himself, answered it.

"Hi, Sirius. Not going to work?" Remus heard Peter's voice from the doorway.

"Nope."

Peter walked in with Sirius, discussing the Pineapple Incident. Peter chuckled.

"Stay for breakfast, Pete, we never see you anymore," offered Remus. "Sirius was just about to make some, after James went and filched all of mine."

"Hey," said Sirius, "I am not spending my day off serving you, Moony."

Remus looked aghast. "I wouldn't dream of it. Imagine. My whole day would be ruined."

Peter chuckled. "So what are you doing, Sirius?"

Sirius grinned at Peter. "Come along and find out."

Peter glanced at Remus warily. "Is he going on his bike?"

Remus nodded.

Peter paled, muttering to himself. "Er, it's okay, Sirius, I just remembered—I have to go to work today, unlike _some_ people, my boss doesn't think I'm cute—"

Sirius was cooking breakfast haphazardly. "Ah. Amelia Bones. She is something."

Remus snorted. 

**Author's Notes: ** Fluff? Dunno. This looks like it is going somewhere, so stay tuned for part three…what does Sirius do on his day off?


	3. Airtime

**Author's Notes: **Okay, I've rethought this story over, and decided it's going to take a less fluffy approach from now on. Don't worry, it'll still be pretty happy. ^_^ The summary has been redone, and it's about the Marauders as a family, but that's all changing, as James wants to marry Lily, Peter has all of those issues with Voldie, Remus feels left out because he has no job, and Sirius…being Sirius. Anyways, right now the War is going on, but Sirius and James are still training. I supposed this is their first year out of Hogwarts, so they aren't doing too much as Aurors yet, although more than what normal trainees do—Order of the Phoenix coming soon. James knows about it, but Sirius doesn't.

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Sirius grinned to himself, feeling the wind in his hair. Oh yeah. Life was good. Auror training was great—Mad-Eye let them do stuff they were allowed to do in Defense— not that it stopped them anyways. Amelia Bones was his head supervisor, despite being only two years his senior, and yeah, she was great. 

Clouds drifted by, and the familiar hum of his motorbike thrummed below him. Sirius honked at a couple of birds, who squawked at this noisy intruder of the sky.

Yes, life was great.

Sirius fingered his new leather jacket—very popular among the Muggles. The Aurors were encouraged to learn about current Muggle trends and styles, so as not to look conspicuous when undercover. Sirius chuckled, remembering one episode when a woman asked Mad-Eye if he was starring in the Shakespeare play downtown.  

Nothing could go wrong today.

Suddenly his bike gave a great shudder. It spluttered and stopped in midair. 

Sirius blinked at looked down. It was very far away. "No, no, no…" he muttered. He pulled out his wand and poked the dashboard and sighed in relief when he heard the engine start again. 

The birds flew back again. One large one squawked at him loudly. 

"Shut up," said Sirius. "I can fly better than you."

It squawked back in a menacing tone. Sirius raised an eyebrow. Was this bird _mocking_ him?

The engine stopped again. Sirius groaned. The bird squawked happily and flew off. "Stupid bird," he said, as the bike plummeted to the ground. 

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**Author's Note: **Sorry that was so short, but got lots of school and stuff to do. Thanks to my spiffy reviewers Nuklear Firefly, Abigail Nicole, oracle, and Windowseat Wonderer. 

Hehe…thanks to Abigail for planting Sirius-disaster fics in my head. Don't worry, I'm not stealing your whole spiffy idea…it'd probably be a toaster instead of printer. ^_^ I'm trying to make this piece as light-hearted as possible, but there will be some dark bits. 

Nuklear Firefly: Pineapples. :)

Oracle: I love Marauder-out-of-Hogwarts fics too. Hehe. 

Windowseat Wonderer: Don't worry, Lily is coming soon! ^_^ If you really want a lot of Lily, check out Cry, my other story.


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